Hi, I have been using this concept as interface between the business strategy and business processes. The main advantage is that allow us to specify what the organization does (value added like proposed by Porter) without the need to specify how it does (business process) in initial meetings... I see services as interfaces for processes as an SLA, were a process could have several, at least at top level processes.. No technological ones..

TOGAF uses the concept of business capabilities, and could be considered a perspective. BPTrends haves some interesting discussions around this theme..

In my case I ham interested for a context of strategy clarification and alignment to the business processes. This allows to find more easily an improvement area without drilling more details regarding to the organization (in my case sport organizations).

Some perspectives about the concept here:

Alec Sharp. (2011, November). Capabilities, Agile, and “Process Blindness.” Retrieved from http://www.bptrends.com/publicationfiles/11%2D01%2D2011%2DCOL%2DPractitioner%27s%20Perspective%2DCapabilities%2CAgile%2CProcess%20Blindness%2DSharp%2Epdf

Harmon, P. (2011, December). Capabilities and Processes. Retrieved from http://www.bptrends.com/publicationfiles/07-12-2011-ADV-CAPABILITIES%20AND%20PROCESSES-HARMON.pdf

If you have some citations about or references to share about Capabilities or Capabilities Approach... It would be nice :-)

Best regards,

Pedro Sobreiro

Hi,

This is my 5 cents to the discussion...

You can find a definition of capability on Resource-Based Theory.

Regarding Barney and Clark, capability can be defined as a quality of being capable, i.e. the firm attributes that enables to exploit its resources in order to implement its strategies.

BARNEY, J. B.; CLARK, D. N. Resource‐Based Theory: Creating and Sustaining Competitive Advantage. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007.

I would say that capability is the ability (social, political, technical, structural) to use the available capacity.

I hope it helps.

best,

Marcos Oliveira

Hi,

Thanks for your answers!

I share Pedro's view on capabilities as a bridge between business strategy and processes. In the CaaS project we consider capability as the ability and capacity that enable an enterprise to achieve a goal in a certain context. In some way, this also connects with the definitions provided by Marcos (by the way, I found interesting to become aware of the 'political' aspect of ability, which may be the key in some situations).

In the project, we are envisioning the goal and the context as the problem-space of the capability, and the ability (e.g. expertise, processes) and the capacity (e.g. resources such as staff and tools) as the solution space. However, we are exploring different flows of tasks for capability-driven development of IT systems.

With regards to the concern by Pedro on the architectural level at which to stop analysing (business, technology, etc.), guess that depends on the project objectives (consulting aimed at finding improvement areas vs. IT development).

Of course, we are very interested in other people's approaches and methodologies. Do you know if there are available case-study reports of capability-driven developments in industry?

By the way, thanks for the interesting references :)

I will post some links to project deliverables and publications when they are available for public dissemination.

Best regards,

Sergio

Sergio, that kind of sharing would be great.

I will check ASAP Marcos suggestions...

Thanks,

Pedro Sobreiro

Following up this discussion, I'd like to invite you to participate in the following workshops. We are organising them with the intention of exploring what we were discussing here. It would be great to meet you there!

International Workshop on Advances in Services Design based on the Notion of Capabiliy (ASDENCA 2014)

http://delab.csd.auth.gr/caise2014/workshops.php?workshop_id=1

1st International Workshop on Capability-oriented Business Informatics (CoBI 2014)

http://cobi2014.blogs.dsv.su.se

Also, we recently discussed in a meeting the importance of the organisational context when considering capabilities. As I mentioned above, we are considering a capability as the ability and capacity to achieve a goal in a certain context. It seems impossible to ensure that an organisation can fulfill a goal under ANY circumstances. Probably, to achieve that same goal in a context for which the organisation is not prepared, they would need a different set of abilities and/or capacities. For instance, a fire brigade can have the capability of confronting a fire in a small forest under mild weather conditions, but they may be incapable in cases of strong wind. An academy doing certification exams may be capable of handling up to 200 students, but they may be incapable of doing the same for 2000 students at the same time.

Have you ever run into this issue? Do you have any hints on how this is dealt? (initially from a modelling point of view and later from a software development and organisational management p.o.v)

By the way, did you know that there is no term in Spanish for capability? :)

(There is a term for capacity and another for ability, but none for capability). I wonder whether it happens the same in other languages...

Best,

Sergio

Hi,

Interesting discussion; I've been wrestling with this creature for a long time myself. It seems that the research community has not reached a closure of what the basic terminology stands for: “[The] proliferation of definitions and classifications has been problematic for research using the RBV, as it is often unclear what researchers mean by key terminology” (Wade & Hulland, 2004, p. 108).

One problem, I believe, is that “capability” and “resource” are often used more or less interchangeable; as they were mainly the same thing. For example, “Yet, resources and capabilities only lead to competitive advantage if they increase the value or lower the costs of the firm’s products relative to competitors.” (Hoopes & Madsen, 2008, p. 396).

My take is that resources are stuff that can be turned into capabilities, in line with Drnevich, & Croson, (2013, p. 485): “We consider the construct of resources defined as ‘stocks of available factors that are owned or controlled by the firm [that can be]…converted into final products or services by using a wide range of other firm assets and bonding mechanisms’… We also define the construct of capabilities as ‘a firm’s capacity to deploy Resources, usually in combination, using organizational processes, to effect a desired end.’”

This means that resources are context-less, while capabilities are always context-dependent. For example, a hammer is a resource that has the capability to drive in nails, kill somebody or as used as a plummet by attaching a string to it; all depending on the context.

Also, capability is a good term since it can be applied both to people and artifacts.

Drnevich, P. L., Croson, D.C. (2013). Information Technology and Business-Level Strategy: Toward an Integrated Theoretical Perspective. MIS Quarterly, 37(2), 483-509.

Hoopes, G. D., & Madsen, T. L. (2008). A capability-based view of competitive heterogeneity. Industrial and Corporate Change, 17(3), 393–426.

Wade, M., & Hulland, J. (2004). The Resource-Based View and Information Systems Research: Review, Extension, and Suggestions for Future Research. MIS Quarterly, 28(1), 107-142.

I've noticed that the terms Capability and Capacity are often conflated. Maybe national language is the root cause as Sergio suggests.

Has anyone a clear and sited differentiation between these two terms?

I feel that "capability" = willingness to use the "capacity" provided, generally by an organisation. If people are unwilling then the capacity goes unused.

Peter, I will comment on how I understand and use the concepts

What I am about to say needs not be generally agreed :)

although it is aligned with the vision we have in project CaaS.

Capability can be understood as the combination of the ability and the capacity to achieve some goal. The ability is related to the knowhow (skill, knowledge...), and the capacity is related to the resources (people, time, money, tools...).

This already gives the relationship between both concepts.

As I understand it, the willingness comes with the fact that there is a goal. So, If we actually want to achieve the goal, we will indeed apply our abilities and use our capacities.

Of course, when used informally, the terms capacity ability and capability are often used indistinctly.

Any thoughts? other visions?

Thinking about the discussions above (and just for my general benefit), could we articulate the matter as the difference between capability and competency? Could we thus say that capability + resource = competency e.g. an individual has a capability given training (the resource) to become competent in what they have learnt?

Sergio, I like the way you define capability since it includes both the individual (ability) and the resource (capacity). A problem with "capability" as defined in dictionaries is that it can be associated with both individuals " His capability was unquestionable." and things "the capability of glass in resisting heat.". I firmly believe that you need to analytically keep these apart without forgetting their interdependencies and how they mutually influences each other. Perhaps this is most evident in creative activities, as for example when an artist starts out with a vague idea, draw some initial sketches, reflects on this, and so on.

It could be considered that there are several perspectives for the interpretation of capability, like in TOGAF, or understanding processes areas as capabilities, or as a process encapsulation, or as company skills... to name few. At the end, I find more interesting the interpretation of capabilities as what the organization as to do, without specifying how to do, which is more related to processes concepts.

I agree with Sergio.

Capability can be understood as the combination of the ability and the capacity to achieve some goal. The ability is related to the knowhow (skill, knowledge...), and the capacity is related to the resources (people, time, money, tools...).

You can use the capability in areas like economics because the people is motivated by earn money and this is enough motivation for this kind  of people. In the army the defense of the nation is enought motivation for this kind of people. You can use this notion in areas with highly motivated people. 

But software engineering is a entirely diferent area with entirely different people and you need a motivated team for have a success in a proyect, a metodology based only in ability and capacity in IT.

In my experience, you can not or, at least, you don´t want use a metodology based only in capability.

Why? because  many IT organizations can think that capacity+ability is more than this and named than capability but is wrong the capacity define only the goods (constants) and the ability depends of the proyect, a good CaaS team with success in a proyect may fail with other without apparent reason.

The it guys need others motivation for a software proyect, the proyect need a competent director, the people need to feel valued, the proyect must be interesting for the people, that means you need a assemble a team motivated by the project. And you must allow constant innovation by you people as motivation (with limits).

You don´t have a motivated team for a inventory software, thats boring, but, if you consider a "mobile inventory system object tracking based" that`s interesting.

Whatever, my point is the success of a CaaS system depends of motivation and if you think in a metodology capability based consider first the the motivation is the base of the ability.

One important use of the term 'capability' is in the field of software quality assessment.

You find definitions etc.  when you look for CMM (Capability Maturiy Model),  and it s derivatives CSCMI etc.

Also look into the ISO activities with respect to SPICE, ISO/IEC 15504, ISO/IEC 30000 familiy.

Sorry for being late, I am working for several years on the capability topic. As member of the EA capability improvement project of The Open Group and project lead of the EA Capability Navigator (EACN) project we analyzed hundreds of scientific publications as well as related frameworks and practical findings like Gartner research results.

However, a capability represents the ability of an enterprise to join resources and information in order to support a strategic goal. This combination is applied in consideration of the specific context and executed in a defined and repeatable activity / process for which certain roles / actors take responsibility in order to produce a desired outcome.

We distinguish between three capability types:

1. Business Capabilities (business context)

2. EAM Capabilities (architectural context)

3. IT Capabilities (IT context)

Basically, these types have different kinds of context (Sergio, I know in CaaS you use the term context as well with another shape), which in turn depend on the area of application. For instance, the context of business capabilities represents a combination of objects of the business architecture (e.g., product, market, or customer) and management activities, whereas the EAM capabilities context is defined as a combination of architectural objects (e.g., application, information flow, or component) and management functions.

Current activities: analyzing the entire AIS Electronic library for capability approaches, summary of our capability framework analysis in a book publication

thanks Matthias.

I am seeing agreement is the answers posted:

Capability: the ability/skill/resource available to complete a task.

Capacity: the time (volume)available/scalability to perform the task within a time limit.

for example: Matthias has the knowledge and skills  to be able to analyse the AIS Electronic Library but it is a very large task so he (his individual capacity) cannot finish the task tomorrow (by himself).

thanks

Peter

Thanks for the summary, Peter.

However, in project CaaS we consider resources to be part of the capacity of the organisation.

This conception would also be consistent with your example: "Mathias would not be able to finish the task tomorrow because the resources (just himself) are insufficient. Perhaps 50 workers like Mathias would finish in time."

In project CaaS we have decided this:

Capability = Ability (competences, knowhow, skills, etc.) + Capacity (staff, tools, money and other resources) ... that are needed to achieve an organisational goal in a given context

We have operationalised this conceptual framework by defining a modelling language (supported by a metamodel) and implementing a modelling tool.

Of course, I do not expect that this framework fits everyone :-) but it happens to work well for us, based on the results of the proofs of concepts we are performing in companies such as everis Spain, SIV Germany and CLMS UK.

Best.

  Sergio

Sergio that's a useful clarification. I like it - Simon

I know I am late to this discussion but it is near and dear to me.  I work in command and control of joint military operations and in my view capabilties are based on the boundary of influence of command and control that you have over the end goal.  We usually start with a mission thread which is already a lower process or group of processes to achieve some specific goal.  The overall goal is at the strategic level and we are always struggling with how to unite towards the strategic but that tie within a system that isn't self-organizing always stops at some border of the boundary that has been established (objectively or subjectively) by the process owners.

In reality all outcomes (which are what capabilities are driving towards) are preceded by processes and from a systems approach we have to go back to the foundation of a system which is mainly four parts: manpower, methods, infrastructure, and materials. We have to add to these four one more...policy because it is important from a governance point of view as it is the outside influences that affect the other four parts of a system.  I have come to the conclusion that IT is not any different and in fact has the same five areas of a system and thus feeds a capability by the user interface (manpower); applications (methods); infrastructure (hardware); and materials (data).  Policy could be the standards that are used to bring all four of the parts together, which is how they collaborate with each other.

This gives you a simplified view of IT and fits with the SOA approach as the three types of services; Task services (applications); Utilty services (infrastructure); Entity services (data).  The one part of the system that is the same or common is the user interface because it is where the IT system has to interface directly with the human.  This I have worked on as the Commom User Interface.  This is when you determine if the process requires a human to human interchange or if this is machine to machine interchange.  The hybrids are the areas of special interst to me as the human to machine and the machine to human are the areas of flexibility and change where we need to design for composability of the functions within the capability to change as necessary the processes to seek new patterns of solutions that will change the end state without going back to R&D.  This is the future I seek for the warfighter and it is the same as I see it will be for industry to be adaptive to change within the environment.

The concept of CaaS is new to me and I am not sure I understand because it has to be bound by something for it to be used.  As for example anything within a SOA construct service could be construed as a capability of sorts.  They all have behind them some efforts of a system [manpower (user interface); methods (application); infrastructure (hardware); and materials (data)] to develop them and thus you could classify them as a capability.  But from where I live, that needs to be defined as a larger piece of an organizations abilities to act and as I mentioned that means that the organization has to first define its boundaries of influence, within and outside the organization in order for this to be determined.

Hello Sergio,

Thank you for bring up this important topic.

Your users should define the capabilities that they want and need, not the developers, and not the financial managers. For example, this actually happened:

Q: Why is your organization using this software package/system?

A: Because it was expensive to buy.

Q: Does it meet your requirements?

A: No, it lacks key capabilities and acceptable reliability.

My experience in IT support of the Navy will be of interest to you. Please browse my ResearchGate web page for relevant information-management articles.

Good luck.